


It Means The World

by PuckPip24601



Category: Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005), Sarah Jane Adventures
Genre: Angst, Sorry guys, This Is Sad, i just miss Sarah Jane and rewatched SJA today, was feeling some things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:07:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23057458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuckPip24601/pseuds/PuckPip24601
Summary: Then she realised the heavy silence that had followed her question. She found it strange, her conversation with Jo so far had been light hearted in nature so it was a big shift for it to suddenly feel like this. She looked away from the book shelf she’d been perusing through and back to Jo who was staring at her with sad, pity filled, eyes. The Doctor felt her hearts drop to her stomach and dread spread throughout her body at that expression. She knew it far too well.“Doctor...” Jo started, her tone gentle, but the Doctor cut her off with a shake of her head.“No.” The word came out whispered and Jo’s face only scrunched up further in guilt and pity.
Relationships: The Doctor & Jo Grant, The Doctor & Yasmin Khan, Thirteenth Doctor & Jo Grant, Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan
Comments: 10
Kudos: 121





	1. Chapter 1

She’d been aiming for the waterfalls of Migratia VI but when she stepped out of the TARDIS she instead found herself in what looked to be someone’s backyard. She took a second to gather her bearings, noting that this was definitely Earth rather than being anywhere close to the planet she’d been aiming for. The Doctor sighed heavily, giving the edge of her ship a light knock in response. Never taking her where she wanted to go that ship. 

She heaved out another sigh and looked around at where they were as she waited for the fam to join her outside. It was a nice garden, as far as gardens went. Lush and green and colourful and definitely well kept. Looking down she grimaced as she realised she may have landed on the corner of a vegetable patch. She was going to have to apologise for that. Or maybe just leave a note. The house that was situated at the top of the garden was just as quaint. A single little bungalow with vines and ivy growing up it but it looked well loved and in good repair for it’s apparent age.

She’d just begun to shuffle impatiently to her other foot when the door to the bungalow was thrown open. The figure inside rushing out with wide eyes. She recognised the figure. They both stared at one another with wide eyes before the Doctor broke out in a brilliant grin.

“Jo Grant!” The older looking woman blinked for a moment, confusion clear across her features as she tried to come up with a reason for this woman to know her name. Never mind the TARDIS next to her, the Doctor knew it would take a moment with her new face for Jo to put two and two together. When it finally clicked into place Jo let out a bark of laughter and threw herself forward to gather up the Doctor’s hands in her own as her eyes raced over the Doctor’s figure.

“Doctor!? You changed. You- you’re a woman!” Jo laughed yet again at the absurdity of her words but she didn’t seem all that put out, just bemused so the Doctor beamed.

“I am! It’s all very new you know, still, you spend 2000 odd years as a man, gotta take some time to get used to all the little differences.” Jo laughed again, shaking her head in disbelief then her smile softened into something kind and distinctly happy.

“I’m so glad to see you Doctor.”

“Me too Jo Grant.”

“You didn’t meant to land here did you?” The Doctor paused for a moment, considering lying for a split second before a bashful grin spread across her face and she shook her head finally.

“No, sorry. I was aiming to take the Fam to a tourist planet on the third quadrant. TARDIS had other ideas, I am sorry about the vegetable patch.” Jo’s eyebrows pulled together in confusion for a split second before she looked down and frowned at the clearly destroyed edge of her patch.

“I-“

“Doctor!” She was cut off as the door to the TARDIS was tugged open and Yaz stuck her head out, her own frown appearing at their non waterfall looking destination, before she looked to the Doctor and Jo and raised an eyebrow, her face softening in greeting as she looked between the two women. “Oh, hello?”

“Yaz!” The Doctor grinned excitedly and reached for the young human, tugging her out and to her side, “meet Jo Grant! She used to travel with me!”

“Hiya, Yasmin Khan.” Yaz accepted the hand Jo held out for her to shake and Jo rolled her eyes fondly at the Time Lord before she piped up quietly.

“It’s Jones Doctor.”

“Sorry?” The Doctors blinked in confusion and frowned and Jo held back a grin. 

“Jo Jones. I haven’t been Grant since before I got married almost 50 years ago.” The Doctor visibly scowled at the prospect of having to call her by a different name but eventually sighed heavily and leaned somewhat huffily against her ship behind her.

“Fine, Yaz, meet Jo Jones.” The words must’ve felt weird in her mouth because she over pronounced them for no reason what so ever and Jo sniggered, throwing a kind grin to Yaz as she finally fixed her full attention to the young woman.

“You’re the Doctor’s new companion?”

“Uh, yeah, not just me. There’s Ryan and Graham as well.” Yaz shoved her hands in her pockets and nodded.

“Three of you?”

“Speaking of those two where are they?” The Doctor whirled around Yaz to her other side and pushed open the door again to stick her head inside and yell into the depth of the ship, “Oi! You two! Get out here and meet Jo!”

“Did you used to travel with the Doctor then?” Yaz asked pleasantly, both human’s outside ignoring the Doctor’s calls into the TARDIS for the time being.

“Oh, yes but it was a long time ago. I was barely twenty when I met him the first time. It’s been even longer for him- her. Oh,” she laughed again softly, gaze running over the Doctor again before she shook her head, “this is still so strange.”

“You know her when she was a bloke then?” Yaz piped up, now visibly excited, “she keeps mentioning it, but we’d honestly thought she was pulling the other one with us.”

“Who knows who when she was a bloke?”  
Graham asked as he and Ryan stepped out of the TARDIS, the Doctor closing the door behind them. Jo threw them both a friendly smile and a wave before she answered Yaz’s question.

“The Doctor always has tended to change his face, though this one is a bigger change than usual.”

“What did he look like? Back then?”

“Older. Much older. Went around in an opera cape. Though I imagine that flair for the dramatic hasn’t changed much.”

“White haired Scotsman?” Graham piped up, remembering some of the Doctor’s first words to them and Jo frowned, eyebrows knitting together.

“No, he was quite English sounding back then. Very pronounced.”

“So where did the Scotsman come in?” Ryan glanced to the Doctor who shrugged.

“I’ve had a lot of faces Ryan, not everyone’s met all of them. In fact very few people, if any have met even half of them.” The Doctor leaned against the TARDIS again, looking very blasé for someone who was mentioning the fact that she had changed into a different person multiple times.

“Would you like to come in for some tea?” Jo asked the moment a silence began to fall over the group and the Doctor’s eyes shone in affection as she nodded, pushing away from her box to follow the older human into her house.

“Of course.”

><><

“The last I saw of the Doctor, he was very young looking, even younger than her now. In a bow tie.”

“And a chin.” The Doctor piped up, happily munching on a jammy dodger from the plate Jo had supplied once they sat down to tea.

“There were these strange vulture looking creatures that-“

“The Claw Shansheeth.” The Doctor cut in helpfully before falling quiet again to allow the woman to finish.

“Yes, those. They had announced that the Doctor was dead after trapping that version of him on a junk planet and stealing his TARDIS. They tried to use me and another old companion of his, Sarah Jane Smith, to create a copy of the key, using our memories. But the Doctor managed to build a transporter and teleport himself there. He managed to save us.”

“Psssh.” The Doctor scoffed, affection gleaming in her eyes again as she pointed her half eaten biscuit Jo’s way, “you two saved yourselves. That’s the thing with memory scanners, easily overwhelmed. I just had to tell you what to do, you both did the rest all by yourselves.”

Jo gave her own small scoff, her cheeks pink with a pleased light blush as she waved the Doctor’s praise off.

“So that’s a third face then, at least. Apart from this one.” Graham spoke up after a long sip of his tea, “old with an opera cape, white haired Scotsman and young with a bow tie.”

“Young with a bow tie and then white haired Scotsman.” At Graham’s confused frown the Doctor elaborated with a grin, “bow tie me came first.”

“Right, course.” Graham scoffed into his tea in amusement and shook his head lightly.

“How long ago was that then?” Ryan asked Jo, “since you saw that version of the Doctor?”

“Oh, must be 7 or 8 years now. Maybe longer even.” Jo said.

“So you went through at least 2 of those, erm, god what’d you call them? Regenerations? In under 10 years?” Graham frowned at the Doctor, visibly concerned, “you don’t half blow through them.”

“It’s been much longer for me. I was...” she paused, trailing off as she thought back to that day, so long ago, “I was still travelling with the Ponds, but it was after they were married but before... was I even over a 1000 yet?” She blinked, eyes darting to the side to look at nothing as she tried to put together the time line in her head, “I was either just under a thousand or only just, very slightly, over it. And i’m definitely over 2000 now, don’t remember by how much. So it’s been much longer for me.”

“Took your time between visits.” Jo teased and watched the Doctor’s face fall in guilt and smiled in reassurance, “it’s alright. As long as you spared me a thought once every few hundred years, I can live with it.”

“Course I did Jo.” The Doctor returned her smile and, after a moment of quiet, Graham stood after sitting his empty tea cup down on the table again.

“Right, we’ll jump back to the TARDIS and leave you two to catch up for a bit I think.”

“Oh don’t be silly.” Jo started but the three of them had already started towards the door with their own reassuring smiles.

“Nah, some things, I think, are maybe better said between two mates. I hope you have a better luck getting her to talk than us.” Yaz leaned in to hug the older woman, near whispering into her ear before she headed towards the back door, following Graham and Ryan. Jo looked to the Doctor in question and the Time Lord’s cheeks appeared to be burning in a slight embarrassment. She chuckled softly and got to her feet to begin clearing away the empty cups. As she stepped into the other room the Doctor rose to her feet to begin properly looking around the living room and taking in all the nic-naks and pictures lying about. One of the bookcases at the back of the room had a shelf free of books but was filled with pictures and other little objects and that’s where she started. There was plenty of Jo and her husband. Pictures of them grinning together all across the world and she smiled at them, glad that her friend had a happy life.

There was one of Jo with herself way back when. That opera cape wearing version. The two of them stood in front of Bessie, his arm around her as they both grinned for the camera. Another was of Jo with the Brigadier, Mike Yates and Sgt. Benton outside the old U.N.I.T head base. There was a small Incan statue for luck and a couple other bits and pieces that the Doctor could probably name if she really tried to. Her focus, however, was brought back to Jo as the woman made her way back into the room.

“Speaking of Sarah Jane Smith, how is she? I haven’t seen her in a bit as well, maybe I’ll stop by.” The Doctor grinned, pleasantly bemused at the thought of herself doing a house call. Then she thought about what Sarah’s reaction to this new body might be, and it somewhat solidified her resolve to go. It really had been a long while since she’d seen the woman. Regardless of reasons it would be nice to see her friend again.

Then she realised the heavy silence that had followed her question. She found it strange, her conversation with Jo so far had been light hearted in nature so it was a big shift for it to suddenly feel like this. She looked away from the book shelf she’d been perusing through and back to Jo who was staring at her with sad, pity filled, eyes. The Doctor felt her hearts drop to her stomach and dread spread throughout her body at that expression. She knew it far too well.

“Doctor...” Jo started, her tone gentle, but the Doctor cut her off with a shake of her head.

“No.” The word came out whispered and Jo’s face only scrunched up further in guilt and pity.

“I’m sorry, Doctor.” Her voice was filled with all the empathy that she’d always had when these types of conversations had had to come up but the Doctor couldn’t latch onto it. The grief started to spread from inside her hearts, across her whole body. Swarming her with a familiar darkness until she was almost overwhelmed and tried frantically to shut everything down internally before she burst out crying right here and now. Her respiratory bypass system failing to kick in as her chest started to rise and fall faster and then her eyes began to water and she spun back to the bookshelf before they could be seen.

“What happened? Was it- did something happen to her while she was investigating? Who did it?” The thought occurred to her as she was talking. That perhaps some alien or creature Sarah had been fighting against had gotten lucky. With that the anger began to rise, the righteous fury spreading through her gut as she prepared herself to hunt whatever it was down and make it pay for ever touching her friend.

“Cancer.” The word blew the wind from her sails and her anger disappeared and gave way to the grief and Jo seemed to realise. She smiled sadly, stepping closer and sitting a comforting hand on the alien’s shoulder until she turned enough so she could see her face. “Just sickness. It was caught too late. She was happy when she went, Doctor. She was with the people she loved, and she knew they’d be alright without her, after.”

A single tear slipped from the Doctor’s eye and down her cheek and the she reached up to brush it away with a shaky intake of breath. 

“I should’ve come to see her more.”

“Don’t be silly.” Jo rolled her eyes, smiling reassuringly when the Doctor’s gaze snapped to her in shock and she was quick to pull the alien in for a tight hug. One that the Doctor took a few seconds to respond to, her body tense for about 15 seconds before she relaxed into Jo’s hold and clutched her back tightly, tucking her face into the woman’s shoulder. “Both Sarah Jane and I, and everyone else who’s ever travelled with you knows how you are. You don’t want to watch us get old and die.” The Doctor flinched at the word but Jo continued onward without stopping, getting the words out, “but you visited. You let her know you’d never forgotten her. That those years she spent travelling with you didn’t mean less to you than they did to her. That’s all she could’ve asked of you Doctor. You’re far too old to concern yourself with the petty worries of people like us but yet here you are. And here you grieve for us. It means the world.”

The Doctor’s grip on her tightened in response and she burrowed her face further into the woman’s shoulder, a few more tears falling silently down her face.

“My Sarah Jane.” She mumbled, the words grief stricken and Jo let out her own pained noise and pulled back so she could wipe the tears from the Doctor’s face, her touch gentle. Wrinkled hands appearing so old against the youthful smoothness of the Doctor’s cheeks but neither said anything about that. The Doctor’s eyes shut, clearly embarrassed by her visible reaction. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re grieving a friend. You’re allowed to cry Doctor. No one would judge you.”

“It hurts to cry Jo, and I’ve done so much of it in my life.” She whispered her words again, ancient eyes flickering open and locking onto her former companions. Jo took in her own shaky breath and gathered up her hands in her own again.

“Sometimes we have to feel that hurt before we are able to move on Doctor. This isn’t the first friend you’ve lost, and though I wish it wasn’t so, it won’t be the last. We all have our time. Our lives are minuscule compared to yours, no wonder you space out your visits, if you visit at all. I’d rather you remembered me young and adventurous, rather than like this. Old.”

“You’re not old, I’m old.”

“I’m old for a human.” Jo smiled, “and I’m thankful for the time we spent together, just like I know Sarah was. We wouldn’t change any of it for the world. And as long as you carry those memories of us, in your hearts, we couldn’t ask for anything more.” The Doctor’s face scrunched up in grief yet again, but she got a control of it this time, stopping herself before she properly started crying and quickly gathered Jo back onto her arms again for another hug.

“Always.” She told her.

A while later, once both women had parted from their hug and shared a few more words of goodbye, the Doctor stepped back out into that pretty garden and took one last glance backwards to where Jo was stood in the doorway, watching her. Her eyes were red rimmed but she was smiling.

“Goodbye Doctor.”

“Goodbye Jo Grant.” Jo laughed at her use of her maiden name but simply shook her head and let it slide. She watched the Time Lord turn away again and step back inside her TARDIS. There was a few moments before that wheezing groaning sound started and Jo watched that magnificent blue box disappear from her garden and from what was probably going to be the last time in her life.

Then she saw the damage to her vegetable patch.


	2. Chapter 2

Yaz was still awake late that night when she felt the TARDIS give the tell-tale shudder of having landed. She climbed from her bed, grabbing her housecoat from the back of her room door and sliding her feet into her waiting trainers, and headed towards the console room to find the Doctor and ask her where they were. The woman had disappeared for the whole rest of the night after they’d left Jo Grant earlier in the day. All plans, once she’d brought them into the vortex, had apparently been forgotten because the Doctor hadn’t said a word to them and had disappeared down the corridor deep into the TARDIS with her shoulders hunched and an air of sorrow over her that she hadn’t given them a chance to question before vanishing.

Yaz found the console room empty, much to her surprise. She also found one of the doors out of the TARDIS lying open and she made her way towards it, ready to call out for the Doctor only to pause in the doorway once she saw what was outside. It was a graveyard. And it was night. The TARDIS was parked in between the rows and rows of headstones and as Yaz looked out she could just make out the Doctor’s small figure stood a little way away at a gravestone holding something in her hands. It was long, whatever it was, folded up multiple times in her arms but its ends still dragged across the grass. The air of sorrow and grief was still evident, Yaz was struck for a moment by just how sad the woman was. Her head was tilted forward as she looked down the gravestone in front of her, her shoulders were hunched and… shaking. As she narrowed her eyes and leaned forward slightly Yaz realised. The Doctor was crying. They appeared to be silent tears but she was trembling, clutching the long, soft, object to her chest, looking down at the grave with such grief on her face that Yaz wanted to go to her and give whatever comfort she could. But somehow, she knew that it wouldn’t be welcomed right now. With one last glance out towards the Time Lord, Yaz made the choice to step back inside the TARDIS and leave the other woman to her grief. She would ask her later.

><><><><><><

Luke was tired. Even with the later start to the morning and the day off of work he was still yawning as he and Sky made the trek up towards their mother’s gravestone. The thought of her still made his heart pang painfully in his chest. It had been less than a year since her sudden passing and he still didn’t feel like he’d ever truly move on. Sky was quiet at his side, letting him lead the way. Both of them still mourning and struggling with how much heavier the grief seemed to get the closer to her gravestone that they got. As it came into view, however, Luke stopped. Something was draped over his mother’s gravestone. For a moment, he got angry, furious that someone would think of just dumping something atop it but, as he got closer, he realised that it was a scarf. Not just any scarf. A very, very long scarf that he recognised from pictures he’d been shown and from the stories he’d been told about the Doctor. It was wrapped around the body of the stone a few times, both ends of it lying over the top as though over someone’s shoulders, it’s end tassels brushing the grass that had begun to grow on top of the ground below.

It looked like it had been placed there recently, so Luke began craning his head around, looking for any sign of the man but all that surrounded them was a field of graves that was surrounded itself by trees. Sky approached the scarf first, picking up one of the ends and running the soft fabric over her hand.

“What is it?” she asked him quietly and Luke swallowed down the emotions pushing their way up his throat before answering.

“It belonged to an old friend of mums. A really close friend.”

><><><><><><

Yaz came back out of her room once she felt the TARDIS move once more. Her steps more hesitant now, unsure as to what would be waiting for her in the console room. Unsure as to what to do if the Doctor was still crying. The Doctor didn’t cry. Not for as long as Yaz had known her at least. She mostly just pulled away when sad, changed the subject and refused to bring it up no matter what the rest of them said to her. Yaz was expecting much the same to come from this conversation when she finally asked but no one could say that she hadn’t tried. The Doctor wasn’t at the controls of the ship like she’d thought she would be. Instead she was sat at the doors of the ship, both pulled open so she could sit on the ground with her legs hanging out as she gazed outside, her shoulders still slumped unhappily. She approached slowly but made sure to be heard, giving the Doctor ample time to tell her to get lost if she wanted her to. She didn’t. Yaz came to a stop next to her at the doors and looked out, breath catching at the sight outside. It was some kind of galaxy, swirling in an expanse of pinks and blues with bright twinkles of stars and planets throughout. Absolutely beautiful.

She glanced back down to the Doctor, and of how sad she looked staring out at this kind of beauty and Yaz squared her shoulders and slowly lowered herself down next to the woman, her own legs swinging outside the box, matching the Doctor.

“You alright?” she asked quietly, surprised when the Doctor answered with something other than a forced smile and a ‘I’m fine’.

“A close friend of mine died, and I feel guilty for not visiting more. I hadn’t known until Jo told me.”

“I’m sorry.” Yaz offered softly, unsure once more on how to approach an honest conversation with the Doctor without Graham and Ryan there to back her up when the conversation trailed off. “Was that who’s grave you were at?” The Doctor gave a single nod, and the two fell into silence once more. “Who was she?”

“She used to travel with me.” The Doctor sighed, leaning against the door next to her, “I always forget what tiny life spans you lot have, I go so much time in between that it’s always a surprise when time finally catches up with you.”

“Makes you wonder why you put up with us at all.” Yaz tried to crack a joke but it only ended up having the Doctor looked around to her with a near horrified expression.

“You lot are amazing, what are you talking about?”

“I just mean, we’ve got such short life spans compared to yours, surely it would’ve made much more sense to go somewhere else instead of Earth to find folks to travel with.”

“If I hadn’t come to Earth, then I never would have met all the remarkable people that I have. People like you, Graham and Ryan.” The Doctor finally gave a little smile and it was one shining with pride for all her friends, past and present. “I’d rather have just 80 years with people like you lot than never have met any of you in the first place. It’s worth the hurt.”

“Why though? We your favourite species?”

“Thought that should have been obvious by now.” The Doctor hummed out in amusement, “course you are. Like I’d said, I’d rather 80 years with you lot than to have spent the last 2000 odd years never having grown to know the amazing creatures that are human beings. To know your endless capacity for love and compassion, for forgiveness. Your strength and endurance through pain and tragedy and your abilities to move on from it. It’s astounding to me; it still is after all this time. I’m amazed at how you lot can look at me and see someone worth following, worth your loyalty, worth caring about.”

“Course you are.” Yaz shook her head softly in disbelief over the Doctor’s words, “you’re wonderful, you are. Most amazing person I’ve ever met. Look at what I get to see because of you.” She motioned outwards, to the colourful expanse before them, “I just worry about you, for after we’re gone.”

“I’m old Yaz, you don’t have to worry about me. But humanity, you touch the most stars in the sky, you spread further across the universe than any other species in all of time and space. You lot are the only other species apart from my own that figures out time travel. It’s not as sophisticated, or as pleasant, but you do it. Your whole species, driven by a need to learn. It’s inspiring. It always has been, even before I’d ever been. Learning about the Earth back at my days in the Academy.”

After such shining compliments towards her species, the two fell into a much more comfortable silence with one another, both looking out into the vastness of space out in front of them, their legs swinging in tandem.

“Who was she?” Yaz asked, “your friend?”

“Her name was Sarah Jane Smith. And she used to travel with me. A long, long, long time ago. I was barely 500, she was my best made. She was a journalist, and I took her to see the stars…” the Doctor continued her stories through the night, eyes watering with tears but filled with so much love that Yaz had no desire to stop her and soaked in the stories for as long as the Doctor was willing to share.


End file.
